Problems
Massillon Cable TV Digital Douchebaggery
I feel a little stupid for not realizing this before, but it just hit me this morning. Among the myriad of problems we will be facing with Digital TV, is the neutering of all home-built DVRs.
I spent a lot of money building up my refurbished Media Center computer to be able to record television shows while I am at work.
NOW, my local cable company is shifting to ALL DIGITAL, using the broadcast changeover to justify their decision to screw everyone. I’ve seen their digital feed, and pixellating images are the order of the day with their sub-par service. The picture freezes, fits, and starts are not welcome here. They also have raised the price!
I almost have to have their crappy digital cable because I need internet access. There is AT&T DSL available, but I canceled my phone service through them because of their bullshit opposition of net neutrality, and didn’t regret it in the slightest when I heard about all the warrantless wiretapping. I refuse to give them any money when they actively seek to censor the internet, and spy on American citizens.
The cable company too, is now skating the edge of losing their funding with my hard earned dollars. If you want to have internet access, without paying the $55 a month for ‘basic’ cable tv, you are assessed a $10/month “line accesss charge,” which is complete bullshit. The only way around it is to pay $21.75/month for “welfare/ghetto” cable (you know, just channels 2-22, the major networks plus local access, and c-span, and the spanish channel. Only about 5 of those are decent channels and that includes the PBS). The only funny thing is that you can add HD and Internet packages onto the Ghetto Cable service, thus keeping your bill somewhat reasonably priced.
I think I’m stuck getting one of their stupid converter box things, then leaving the box on all the time, and switching it to the channel I want to record on, before I head off to work. Then, even though I’ve got a DUAL-TUNER PC card, I would almost bet 1 trillion dollars that the f-digital converter box only does one f-channel at a f-time!
I’m just a little bit pissed, can’t you tell?
Fuck you, Massillon Cable TV.
Edit: Now that I did a little bit more research, I’ve found that they do make dual tuner digital PCI cards, so I’m going to Massillon Cable in the very near future and requesting a service credit of over $100 so that I can buy a new TV tuner card that decodes digital signals. Wish me luck.